I have owned the older Harbor Freight 1/2" cordless impact for a few years and it has served me "well enough". It can't get super heavy torque bolts off, but I hadn't wanted to buy anything else as a 1/2" breaker bar does live in the tool box, I do have air tools, and anything better would run me upwards of $500.

HF is now selling this bad boy, and it is currently on sale for $229. Holy crap people!

If you don't have air tools, but work on your stuff at home YOU MUST HAVE THIS THING!!!! I used it to knock off a couple sets of lug bolts that would normally make the old gun hit it a good 5-10 times before they let go. This new gun rips them off with just 2 hits. I will put some large bolts/nuts into the vice and do some testing to confirm break loose torque ratings, but HF sure looks to have put another kick ass tool on the market for the home shop.

It may not be very scientific testing, but putting on a nut that requires 525 ft/lb to remove says your tool is pretty damned capable. Some yayhoos in the comments try to say "get a DeWalt instead, it's the same price". Yeah right. A reconditioned, bare tool is $180, and those only carry 90 day warranties. A new bare tool is $210, battery and charger are another $100. So yeah, the DeWalt warranty is longer, and if you have another $100 to spend get it. However, it is not "better" than the HF tool. They have the same level of performance, but the DeWalt has three speeds (more gimmicky than anything), and it's yellow.

I can tell you my experience with the HF tool so far has been awesome! It is a great tool to have, and if it lives as long as my older one, it'll be around more than 3 years.